and the smoke of their torment will ascend up for ever and ever: and they will have no rest day nor nightu!" Who can reflect on this, and not determine, through grace, to shun so awful a doom, and to make " the long-suffering of God the means and prelude of everlasting salvation*?"]
3. To improve to the uttermost the advantages
we now enjoy —
[This is the day of grace ; " this is the day of salvation," to every soul that desires to be saved y. Yes, truly, " God is not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance, and live2." Do but consider this, my brethren : you will never have to cast the blame of your condemnation upon God. If the day of judgment prove the day of perdition to your souls, the fault will be utterly your own. There is no want of sufficiency in Christ to save any who shall come unto God by him. Nor is there in him any want of willingness to save even the chief of sinners. Of those who rejected him in the days of old, and provoked him to abandon them to utter destruction, he complained, " How often would I have gathered you, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!" The same may he say of you in the day of judgment. Be diligent, then, in the use of all the appointed means of salvation. Repent of all your sins: believe in the Lord Jesus Christ as the Saviour of the world. Flee to him for refuge : lay hold upon him : hide yourselves under the shadow of his wings : and then, in that awful day, when all who offend and do wickedly shall be cast out, you shall stand before him with great boldness, and " be found of him in peace, without spot, and blameless3."]
u Rev. xiv. 10, 11. x ver. 15. y 2 Cor. vi. 2.
2 ver. 9. a ver. 14.